Heirloom Guide: Trial Accounts

03Nov

[Update 09/17/13: Conversion rates between Honor and Justice Points has been increased from 375>250 to 500>250, causing a significant increase in the amount of farming required.]

With F2P Twinks on the rise right now I’ve been asked a lot about writing an heirloom guide just for them, and this is that guide. For those of you who are F2P players, realize that twinking is about optimization which means you’re aiming for the best, even if the best only comes after days or even weeks worth of farming for only a single piece of gear. That means I’m not only looking at the heirlooms that you purchase with honor points, I’m looking at all of them. I am suggesting PvP heirlooms, but they aren’t the sole focus of this guide.

If you only want to know which PvP heirlooms to get for your class then there’s really no reason for me to bother writing a guide because there’s almost no overlap at all withing the PvP heirloom sets. If you need shoulders, you pick the ones with the stats for your class and spec. If you need a weapon, you pick the one with the stats for your class and spec. It’s really that simple if you’re only going to look at PvP heirlooms.

If you’re serious about twinking, though, then this is the guide for you.

Heirloom Currency and Conversion Rates
This guide is written primarily with F2P twinks in mind, so I’m making a special effort to include the PvP heirlooms in these lists. However, keep in mind that this is a twink guide for F2P accounts, so optimization is still the top priority.

I’m going to list options for both PvP Heirlooms and PvE Heirlooms, so I want to get you started off with the conversion chart. If you want to know how much honor you need to farm on your level 20 twink in order to purchase a specific PvE Heirloom then this is your key to that knowledge.

ARMOR

SHOULDERS

WEAPONS

TRINKETS

Honor Cost

2,175

2,175

2,175 – 3,500

2,725

Justice Conversion

4,350

4,350

4,350 – 7,000

5,450

Renting Heirlooms: Keep in mind that you can sell heirlooms back to the vendor within 2 hours of purchase for a full refund. So if you have enough Honor to purchase any heirloom that will help you while you’re saving up for a more expensive heirloom, you do have the option of buying the one you can afford now, using it for a match or three, and then selling it back to the vendor and then buying it once again.

Basically, you can rent any heirloom that you can afford for up to two hours at a time. If you’re trying to get the Dignified Headmaster’s Charge (DHC), for instance, you can instead buy the Grand Staff of Jordan (GSoJ) to use in two hour spurts before selling it back the vendor and then immediately buying it right back while you continue to earn additional Honor to put towards the DHC.

Keep in mind that when you do this you cannot put any permanent enchants on the items or else they cannot be returned to the vendor. I think you can use temporary enchants like the Shaman’s weapon imbues and then still refund them after the temporary enchants wear off, but I’m not 100% certain of that so do it at your own risk or don’t bother with those enchants on rented ‘looms.

Out of Reach Heirlooms
There are two types of heirlooms that trial accounts cannot access, which are the Helms and Cloaks that are offered only as guild perks. You can’t join guilds to access them in the first place, and with a gold cap of 10g there’s no way you could ever afford them either. That being the case, I don’t have any heirloom-specific advice for you in relation to these item slots other than to tell you that you can’t get these so don’t worry about them.

I wanted to point this out right at the beginning to make sure nobody missed it. F2P accounts and characters cannot access heirloom helms and cloaks of any kind. At least, not in this patch (4.2 5.4).

Navigating the Guide
Now, in order to help you navigate through the rest of this guide, I’ve set up the following links to allow you to bounce around to the parts you actually want to see. Each class that you click on will take you to a section listing the various sets of heirlooms that I suggest you look into. Each section will also have multiple lists to give you a couple of options to consider.

Each section also contains a list of the enchants that are available for you to apply to that item, listed in the order that I would suggest them. Keep in mind that as a trial account your professions are locked at 100 and you have no access at all to the professions of other players; meaning you cannot trade, purchase, borrow, beg, or steal enchants that you can’t make or apply yourself with only 100 ranks in a given profession. The enchants discussed are permanent enchants only.

Priests, if you’re going to use a staff and you’re a healer, the DHC is a better staff for you. You may be able to get better stats overall by using the main hand heirloom along with other off-hand items that you can either farm, buy, or craft via Inscription.

Mages and Warlocks cannot use the main hand caster mace because they can’t use maces at all. I list the Grand Staff of Jordan as the primary staff option because of the level difference between F2P 20’s and the P2P 24’s, making the Hit on the Grand Staff more valuable overall.

Mage: Discerning Eye of the Beast (x2 if Human)Shadow Priest: Swift Hand of Justice (x2 if Human, or one of each)Disc/Holy Priest: Discerning Eye of the Beast (x2 if Human)Warlock: Swift Hand of Justice (x2 if Human, or one of each)

Rogues cannot wield two-handed weapons, so their only option is dual wielding.Druids cannot dual wield, so they will use either the two-hand (suggested) or main hand listings. It might seem odd that a caster staff is listed as a two-handed option for Ferals, but the GSoJ actually has the second highest two-handed damage of every heirloom in the game. It’s damage is even higher than the Repurposed Lava Dredger, it’s just missing other melee related stats or it would have been listed first. If you see a lot of 24’s on your F2P twink, then you might want to consider using the GSoJ instead of the Lava Dredger anyway because the staff’s +7 Hit will help significantly.

Resto Druids should consider the caster maces over the GSoJ staff, but the DHC staff is your best choice overall.

Balance Druids should strongly consider the GSoJ staff over even the DHC because of the GSoJ’s +7 Hit. Your spells won’t hit as hard as they would with the DHC, but at least you won’t find yourself missing all the time.

Hunters use their melee weapons primarily for their attribute bonuses and to benefit from two weapon enchants instead of one. However, when forced into melee combat a two-hander is usually better than dual wielding.Shamans can use a two-handed weapon, and it is a somewhat reasonable option if you’re looking for higher burst damage, but traditionally they are designed to dual wield.

Trinkets:Hunters: Swift Hand of Justice (x2 if Human)Shamans: Discerning Eye of the Beast or Swift Hand of Justice

Hunters regenerate their focus based on Haste, so you definitely want Swift Hands x2.
Shamans are a hybrid of melee and caster, making both of these trinkets beneficial to them. On the one hand, Discerning Eyes will make you spells and heals hit harder, while on the other the Swift Hand will help you attack and cast a bit faster. I would personally suggest Discerning Eye over Swift Hand.

Since Shamans are able to use Shields, it’s usually suggested that you go with a caster mace over a staff if you’re Alliance. Horde doesn’t have a good level 20 caster shield, so you’ll be better off with a staff.

If you’re Elemental, the GSoJ may be your best option with its +7 Hit bonus, though you do lose some of your survivability by giving up access to a shield. While there aren’t any good Horde shields with caster stats on them, you’re still losing out on 800-900 Armor by using a staff.

Trinkets:
Shamans have a lot of slow cast times and they have shorter range on many of their spells than other classes do with similar spells which makes Haste a touch higher on the priority list than Int for the second trinket slot. Discerning Eyes will make your spells more powerful, so they’re still a very good option.

Paladins may consider using Discerning Eye of the Beast (+7 Int) instead of Swift Hands if they want to increase the effectiveness of their heals, but in most cases for a non-Holy Paladin it’s better to get fast heals thanks to Swift Hands’ haste rather than slightly larger ones from using Discerning Eyes.

Paladins may consider using Discerning Eye of the Beast (+7 Int) instead of Swift Hands if they want to increase the effectiveness of their heals, but in most cases for a non-Holy Paladin it’s better to get fast heals thanks to Swift Hands’ haste rather than slightly larger ones from using Discerning Eyes.

Which trinkets you decide to go with is your call. Personally, I would lean more towards Discerning Eyes because I prefer to stay mobile and use my instant heals as much as possible, so Swift Hands wouldn’t help me much. However, you can always benefit from Haste when it comes to casting heals such as Flash of Light and Holy Light, so Swift Hands are still a reasonable choice.

Nice guide and good of you to assemble it for all to see. A quibble and a point though…

On my F2P hunter I opted for the Shadowcraft gear over the Deathdealer set. The hit rating on the leather was just much more valuable to me as a 20 trying to kill a 24 than the crit and armor I had to sacrifice.

I’ld also add a note that some heirloom gear may not be as good for a F2P lvl 20 as blue gear you can get. My rogue is carrying 2 Wicked Daggers over either of the heirloom options. I just found them too be a better balance of survival and damage (with the added benefit that Wicked Daggers are much faster to farm from ‘Stormwind Stockades’).

Oh, and a reminder, Blizzard is eliminating the ranged slot from all classes except hunters and hunters are losing melee weapon slots in 5.0 (Mist of Pandaria expansion) patch. It is still quite a ways off, but if you are farming you may want to keep it in mind. Warriors and rogues will probably want to buy that ranged weapon as their last piece and hunters their melee weapons last. Would hate to still be slowly farming trinkets and suddenly lose my gun or sword.

Nice points, Kierbuu. I’ve heard mixed reviews on how important people feel that Hit rating is to them, but most people have shown that they don’t especially care about it so I didn’t lean towards Hit when writing the guide. Others were pretty adamant that it was crucial. To each their own, I suppose.

There are certainly better blues in some cases than the heirlooms themselves. I expect every twink to do their own research to find what their BiS gear actually is and which heirlooms they wish to farm as opposed to skipping them in favor of blues or greens that might be better. The purpose of this guide is strictly heirlooms and which ones belong with which spec. I listed the values of each heirloom at level 20 specifically to help you decide whether or not it’s a good piece of gear for you to get.

As for putting off the ranged weapons for melee and melee weapons for ranged, with MoP so far off in the distance that we don’t even have a soft date yet, I’d say it’s way too early to caution against them. Especially since we aren’t certain that that change will even go through. I would certain lean more towards holding off on ranged heirlooms for melee than holding off on melee weapons for ranged as those are still incredible sources of stats.

I’ve done tons of low level fully twinked PvP and I agree with your choices regarding hit; melee generally doesn’t need it but casters very much do. I often go entire battlegrounds without missing a single special while at the bottom of the bracket on a melee character.

I was hoping this article was going to include the best non-heirloom slots as well, but that would have made it about five times longer. There are definitely some choices involved with heirlooms for PvP, and I’ve taken the time to figure out what’s best where myself. I own every heirloom (except that damn ring), so I was able to test every combination, and I agreed with all your choices. It’s good to get that validation.

I just skimmed the write up, good job btw, but you missed the rings completely. If you have the ring on your battle.net account you can still send it to a ftp just like any other items. I have two of them from before you could send them cross account but unfortunately the are unique so I end up either being lazy and not having to send them to alts or using them alot when I dual box.

I added the heirloom ring to the list since it is an heirloom and can potentially be won by a trial account (with the aid of a non-trial account getting them to the fishing locations in the first place).

At first glance, I’m still unimpressed with this ring in terms of twinking. Overall, I’d have to delve back into the wowhead database and see what other rings exist and compare stat weights for individual classes and specs to know whether or not I would honestly suggest that you put in the time and effort to actually attempt competing for this ring.

For holy pallies, should we go for all plate or are there any better choices in the other armor types? Also, would it be worth it to sacrifice some intel to get the resi on the honor mace? Do resi even work at this level?

F2P’s can get to Northrend, they just need non-F2P’s to get them where they’ll be going.

I have the gear for Holy Paladins (and every other class/spec) in the article. And no, sacrificing Intellect for Resilience is not a good idea, especially in a level bracket where you can’t stack enough resilience to make that sacrifice worth it. Resilience does exist and does have an impact even at low levels, it just isn’t enough to matter.

How the heirloom trinkets compare to the AGM depends entirely on your class and spec. Generally speaking, AGM > all for twinking. That amount of health plus the bubble is just too strong in low level PvP to pass up. If you’re playing a class that benefits well from Haste then Swift Hands may potentially be better if you’re looking to maximize your output rather than your survivability. Similarly, some casters may prefer the Intellect from Discerning Eyes over the AGM if they want stronger damage/healing rather than survivability.

If you want to get right down to it though, a “real” twink will have 2 AGM’s, 2 Swift Hands, 2 Discerning eyes, and an heirloom PvP trinket that they switch out according to the situation and the location. PvP doesn’t have static roles assigned to people, and you need to be able to adapt to the situation at hand. Extra Stamina might help you when you’re the FC, but it might not be what you’re looking for when you’re hunting down an EFC instead.

You really can’t throw out a blanket question like “which is the best” when it comes to PvP because there are too many variables that cannot be defined. A better question to ask is “which should I get first”, though that almost has too many variables as well. Ask yourself what you need more – survival or output? If it’s survival, get the AGM’s. If it’s output then your class determines whether you need more Haste or Intellect, or a combination of the two. And if you’re not a human, then you want a PvP trinket as well, preferably the heirloom one but the 55 Honor vendor trinket works just as well (minus some resilience). Once you use the PvP trinket it should be switched out for another trinket until its 5 minute duration is going to expire in 30 seconds.

Everyone can wear the insignia and shoulders, including humans if they really want resilience, giving us a base of 5.98% for all characters. Everyone can also use at least a one-handed weapon of some kind, bringing the base total up to 7.51%.

Classes that can use a ranged weapon (non-wand) get another 0.54% for a total of 8.05%.

That amount being available to only Hunters and Warriors as they’re the only classes able to use both a staff and a gun.

In a world where damage ranges from 100-1,000 though, that 10% doesn’t calculate out to a whole lot of damage. Sure, it might save you 100 damage on those big crits, but the rest of the time it’s saving you from 10’s. Over time those small numbers add up to be quite a lot of damage reduction, but you need to decide how important those 10’s are to you in a single game compared to the stronger output of non-Resilience gear of the same level.

I haven’t tried getting the ring on my own trial account, I’m going off of what others have told me. According to them (and I think “them” refers to the twinkinfo.com forums) you can get summoned to Northrend via Warlock summons and HGWT. It wasn’t mentioned specifically in relation to getting this ring, but in relation to getting achievements such as exploration in Northrend.

If that’s not the case, and someone can confirm that for me, I’d be happy to take the ring off of the lists.

The best place to find what you’re looking for is twinkinfo.com. The forums over there are full of twinks who will gladly help you tweak your gear and spec, and you can find BiS gear lists for all classes and specs.

No, they can’t. You require the expansion for the F2P, Only a twink that ALREADY has the expansion can go to Northrend. Since you’re F2P, then there’s no Northrend for you, neither Burning Crusade content. If you want to prove to me otherwise, then take a screenshot and post it here.

With the new Xpac out, F2P trials CAN get to Northrend, now you just hop on the zepplin, then fly to Dalaran, But yes, get to most everywhere IN Northrend, you probably need a friend or two. Havent ventured out of dalaran yet, just went there to get the Kirin Tor Tabard. Me wearing my tabard as proof =)

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